Feds say millionaire killed in plane crash ‘had secret life financing cocaine submarine’

Marty Tibbitts died in 2018 Wisconsin accident that killed 50 cows

A millionaire Michigan businessman killed in a plane crash led a double life financing an international drug ring, according to federal prosecutors

Marty Tibbitts was even building a submarine called “The Torpedo” to haul cocaine across the Atlantic, states a newly unsealed federal indictment.

Mr Tibbitts was CEO of telecommunications company Clementine Live Answering Service but was known as “Dale Johnson” in the drug trafficking world.

The 50-year-old aviation enthusiast died in a 2018 plane crash when the vintage fighter jet he was piloting  crashed into a Wisconsin dairy barn, killing 50 cows.

Details of his drug trafficking activities was included as part of the federal indictment against Ylli Didani, the leader of the global drug smuggling ring that sold cocaine in 15 countries.

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Authorities have charged the 43-year-old with conspiracy to distribute controlled substances on a boat in US jurisdiction, conspiracy to distribute controlled substances, and money laundering.

Mr Didani was arrested by authorities last week in North Carolina.

The two men were allegedly developing the remote-controlled submarine that would attach itself to the hulls of cargo ships using strong magnets.

They planned to fill the submarine with cocaine, track it with GPS and then detach it from the ships 100 miles of European coastlines, where a fishing boat would collect it and take the drugs ashore.

The men had allegedly paid an unidentified company $12,000 in cryptocurrency and an Albanian bank account to develop the submarine.

Investigators say that the company was unaware of the real intended use of the “underwater hull scrubber device” was.

Federal prosecutors say that Mr Tibbitts, who lived in a$6.4 million mansion in Grosse Point, Michigan, was the money behind the smuggling operation since becoming involved in 2015.

And they allege that in 2016 he wrote them a check for $864,000 that was eventually cashed at a pawn shop or gold exchange business.

They also say he flew to Washington DC on a private jet to give Mr Didani $350,000 and in total provided the smuggling operation with more than $1.8 million in funding.

The death of Tibbitts scuppered the planned submarine and caused a financial crunch for the cartel, which was forced to allegedly find new funding in the UAE.

The cartel also saw authorities make huge seizures, with Dutch officials in August 2019 finding 753 kilograms of cocaine hidden in a shipment of bananas in Rotterdam.

And in February 2020 Dutch officials seized 644 kilograms in duffle bags after a tip from the US Drug Enforcement Agency.

Former neighbors of Mr Tibbitts were stunned to hear of his involvement with the cartel.

“I think anybody who would hear something like this would be shocked,” Ari Buchanan told the Detroit News.